Day 2 - Mobile Broadband and Content Conference

(see http://www.cesweb.org/attendees/conferences/search/session_by_track_list.asp?ID_track=MB)

Attended an all day conference organised by Yankee Group in the Venetian hotel to explore some of the issues related to the future of both the Internet and mobile devices – specifically this conference considered issues related to the recent and much “hyped” Web 2.0 - such as managing the users access to digital media across platforms, access to networked applications and services and voice and video communications across various platforms. Key future requirements such as true Wireless Mobility, the effective handling of live or streaming TV, defining Infotainment expectations, creating and managing personalised content and an enhanced and seamless Consumer experience were discussed. A presentation by Jeff Treuhaft of VeriSign was particularly interesting – his company is already very well connected to many aspects of the existing industry.

For many attending the original technology issues around emerging wireless connectivity are now well understood although the time-frames may still be disputed. The more widespread use of wi-fi in 2007 after early take-up in 2006 and the likely widespread take-up of wi-max during 2007-8 (in developed markets) was generally agreed. There remains a mobile phone paradigm i.e. how much can you fit into a device but still keep it thin, light weight and attractive? This will remain an issue and limited space and power will mean users need to make key decisions when buying their next phone. Some thought wi-max may still be overtaken by other technologies such as 4G or UWB before it could reached full maturity. However two key issues are that the streaming of large volumes of data and live TV over these new networks may still depend upon availability of network bandwidth and the impact this will have upon existing distribution rights. New agreements with existing owners of the original content are now needed as the advertising and revenue business models are likely to change and corporations will want new licensing agreements and partnerships to be consolidated before they allow their content to flow freely over the new networks – this is not just a US problem. The evolution from what people want the new web to look like and how long it takes to get there will depend upon many factors and not all of them are technology driven. Once in place the ability to interact with friends and producers of the content during live broadcasts, the ability to share archived moments with others, and the ability to participate in new on-line communities built around common interests are massive.

This conference also fitted very well with my earlier attendance of a keynote presentation by Robert Iger, the CEO of Walt Disney who was attending the CES for the first time as a participant. His company obviously already has a lot of high quality content and now realizes that there is a new market potential to deliver their content to a new audience in alternative ways i.e. The company is currently investing in creating a new Walt Disney website not just for buying downloads or viewing features but also to encourage more interaction with personalized use of the content, the playing of popular character themed games e.g. the Jack Sparrow lifestyle experience, and the creation of new user communities. So do you want to be a pirate too? Their solution is still fairly vertical with corporate control of the content but goes someway to showing what could be happening once other massive content owners and distributors such as Fox become involved and if a more open market approach is taken – there were a lot of Fox representatives at the conference watching the presentations but they were saying little.

Will be happy to discuss this all further upon my return.